Report - Social Watch Philippines

. Women’s economic empowerment
i. Study the impacts of trade agreements and attendant
labor arrangements on the socio-economic
conditions of women, especially the effects of trade
liberalization on women in the rural areas.
ii. Create new sustainable employment opportunities
to address women’s high unemployment
iii. Eliminate gender discrimination in the formal
labor market, such as wage gaps and gender tracking
iv. Enhance the situation of women in the informal
economy by ensuring stronger mechanisms and
processes of social protection.
v. Review and repeal laws, policies and programs
that de-prioritize public expenditures on social services
(e.g., automatic appropriations for debt payments) and
constrict access to the same (e.g., privatization law for
power and water).
c. Rural women 49
i. Implement CARP’s guidelines governing gender
equality in agrarian reform, that all qualifi ed women
members of the agricultural labor force must be guaranteed
and assured equal rights to ownership of land,
equal shares of the farm’s produce, and representation
in advisory or appropriate decision-making bodies.
ii. Recognize women farmers as agrarian reform
benefi ciaries in their own right, not as spouses of male
agrarian reform benefi ciaries.
iii. Implement the issuance of EPs/CLOAs without
prejudice to women’s marital status.
iv. Strengthen women’s access to support services
especially credit.
v. Educate program implementers on legal gender
mandates, gender equality, and women’s rights.
d. Women migrants
i. Strengthen bilateral, regional and international
cooperation with countries of origin, transit and destination
to address traffi cking in women. (The Committee
took notice that “…bilateral agreements and
memorandums of understanding do not exist with
all countries and regions to which Filipino women
72 SOCIAL WATCH PHILIPPINES
migrate and that women workers who migrate to other
countries and regions in search of work opportunities
through informal channels remain vulnerable to becoming
victims of various forms of exploitation = violence
and traffi cking.)
ii. Adopt holistic approaches, such as measures
towards women’s economic empowerment, sus-tainable
development, and the generation of “safe and protected
jobs for women as a viable economic alternative to
migration or unemployment.”
e. VAW
i. Increase awareness on all forms of violence
against women, including domestic violence, marital
rape and incest, and the unacceptability of all such
violence.
ii. Repeal laws and/or amend provisions discriminatory
to women (e.g., the provision in the Anti -Rape
Law of 1997 canceling criminal action and reducing
penalties in the event the offended party pardons the
crime)
iii. Enhance data collection on various forms
of violence (e.g., harmonizing data collection of the
DSWD, PNP, NGOs, etc.) and research the prevalence,
causes and consequences of domestic violence
iv. Conduct consistent and sustained education
and awareness raising on attitudes and stereotypes that
discriminate against women. (The Committee stresses
these stereotypical norms and views as constituting
a “signifi cant impediment to the implementation of
the Convention and…a root cause of violence against
women, as well as of the disadvantaged position of
women in a number of areas, including in all sectors of
the labour market and in political and public life.)
f. Women and climate change
i. Ensure women’s representation, especially of
grassroots sectors in climate change negotiations and
debates.
ii. Conduct participatory gender analysis of
climate-stressed and vulnerable groups and impact
assessments of climate change responses.
49 Culled from “Pantay ang Karapatan ng Kababaihan at Kalalakihan sa Pagmamay-Ari Ng Lupa.” (n.d.)Position Paper. Pambansang Koalisyon
ng mga Kababaihan sa Kanayunan,” (n.d.).